Caught Beast Mate(58)
“Gonna keep it for when you fuck up.” John hunched his shoulders. “Don’t fuck up, asshole.”
“I’m not gonna fuck up.”
“I want grandkids.”
“You got it, man.”
“And she’ll want Bowser.”
“Who?”
“Bowser. Our cat. You’ll need to get the cat. Good luck with that.”
“Is that all?”
“Mm-hm.” He stepped away.
“Hey, John.”
“Yup?” He didn’t turn around.
“Don’t fuck up back in there. Stay cool, be smart, and when it gets tight, reach out so I can pull you out. We’re family. I’ll be there for you, you hear me?”
John nodded and strolled away.
Damn. I hadn’t seen him coming. I lived. Yet again. Perhaps I was destined to serve my people. Great Mother surely stood in my corner. I kissed my mate’s shoulder and prayed I didn’t fuck up.
Zap!
Current zapped my brain, traveled down my neck, and spread around every nerve in my body, triggering my muscles. They contracted and expanded. Why was I in battle form?
I snapped my eyes open, looked around. Still in med bay, sans Sienna, and with white stickers all over my body. I peeled off the ones on my face, my arms, my stomach, my thighs…my legs. Wait a second.
Legs. There were two of them. I blinked, unsure if the current Lers kept zapping me with made my brain see double. I lifted my right leg. The attachment, a gun-metal silver in color, gleamed, polished and clean.
“Wakey-wakey,” came from the speakers.
“Lers?”
“One and only.”
I glanced up at the camera, picturing Lers leaning back in an office chair and twirling his mustache. “Where is my mate?”
“How are you feeling?” he asked.
“You tell me.”
“Whole.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m a great healer.”
“And my mate?”
“Wiggle your toes.”
I looked down at my new metal digits and wondered if it would work. Inhaling, I commanded them to move. They wiggled. “It works.”
“Of course it does. Bend your knee.”
I swung my legs over the bed.
“I wouldn’t,” Lers said.
I ignored him and, careful as the day I started walking, placed my soles on the floor, then balanced with my new limb. It looked out of this world, like something a cyborg species from Hnada would have attached. “Is this leg imported?”
“Only the material used to make it.”
“From Hnada?” I asked.
“Yes.”
I frowned, thinking of the distance between Earth and Hnada. “We had this thing onboard?”
“No.”
Motherfucker. “How long have you kept me down?” They fucking sedated me, implanted me with a new leg, and now I’d lost my mate again.
“Sixty-four Earth days.”
I gaped at the little green blinking camera light. “I will kill you!”
“Which is why I did not show up in person.”
I marched to the door. The cage bars slid over it. I roared, gripped two, and tried to tear them apart.
“Torrent,” Alpha Beast said.
“What?” I strained, but couldn’t move them. Both hands on one, I pulled. Fur sprouted on my back, my muscles contracted, bulged, my jaw jutted out, and I snarled.
“Excellent,” Lers said. “Holds the battle form. Check.”
I snarled at him, still pulling on the cage bar.
“Are you done yet?” Jamie asked.
“Release me.” I leaned my forehead on the bar. “Release me. If you don’t, I’ll go mad. I had her, I had her right there.” I pointed to the bed. “She loves me. He said it, not me. What have you done?”
“Thank you, Alpha Beast, for sending a fleet to retrieve the material for my limb. In record speed.”
I said nothing.
A sigh came from the speakers.
“What do you want from me, hm?” I asked. “I can’t live without her.”
“I want the High Priest.”
I tilted my head toward the camera light. “At what cost? Losing my mate?”
“She is not lost.”
“Where is she?”
“The High Priest.”
“I’ll do it.”
“Hear!” Clapping sounded in the room. A woman hooted.
I waited for the peanut gallery to calm down. “Are you in the control room?” Vice directed the ship from the room. All the pilots and officers sat there. If they sat there, they watched me on a screen the size of a house.
“Yup,” Jamie answered. “Wave a little.”
I ran a hand through my hair. Shaved head. I scrubbed my beard. Cut shorter and braided. I didn’t need a shower either. Ah shit. I narrowed my eyes at the camera. “Sienna, are you watching?”